Subject: Found 50+ year old Watkins Cook Book

From: [email-masked] (Jack Decker)
Date: 29 Jan 1994 23:16:59 GMT

My wife was doing some cleaning today, and came across a Watkins Cook
Book, Copyright 1938, By The J.R. Watkins Company.  The price was $1.50
for this 288 page book.  It is apparently a revised edition of "The
Watkins New Cook Book" that was issued in June, 1936 and had 200 pages.

I thought you folks in alt.business.multi-level (especially any Watkins
distributors that might be lurking here) might be interested in the
printing on the inside cover of the book:

[Bold headline, in box:]
The Pick of The
World's Markets

[Sub-headline in smaller bold type:]
>From the Four Corners of the Earth, Over the Seven Seas
Come the Choicest Raw Materials
>From the World's Finest Markets to the Largest and
Oldest Institution of its Kind in the World

[Regular type in two columns, first word in bold caps with enlarged "Y":]
  YOU have noticed the extra quality, strength and flavor that you get
in Watkins Spices and Extracts-so much better than you can get
elsewhere.  Your mother and your grandmother before her knew the
reputation of Watkins Products for superior quality.  For three
generations we have jealously guarded this reputation.  Each year sees
more scrupulous care in our selection of raw materials, more
refinements in our manufacturing processes-a constant striving to
improve.
  Over seventy years of buying experience coupled with train-load
purchasing power give us the pick of the world's markets at the most
favorable prices.  For instance, we buy more Vanilla Beans than any one
else in the world.  In one single express shipment recently we received
200 red cedar boxes of Vanilla Beans weighing 29,370 pounds-the largest
single express shipment on record.
  Watkins huge spice purchases affect the world's markets noticeably,
for The J. R. Watkins Company is one of the world's largest buyers of
spices.  Naturally, we get the pick of the crop.  Our vanilla bean and
spice experts choose the finest which nature grows.  Only first quality
raw spices, full of the natural oils and with a delightful flavor go
into Watkins Spices.  Then we mill them so they retain those rich,
natural oils which make foods spicy and give them that appetizing zest
and tang.
  This same high quality is packed into every one of the 300 Pure Food
Products, Toilet Articles, Soaps and Cleansers, Household Medicines,
and Stock and Poultry Preparations which come to you under the Watkins
label.  The Watkins trademark on any product is your assurance that it
has passed all the tests which have made the reputation of this great
institution.
  This institution has grown until today it is the largest and oldest
of its kind in the world.  There are 10,000 dealers delivering Watkins
Products direct to the consumer from our great factories and branches
which are strategically located to give customers fresher products and
faster service at saving prices.
  Get better acquainted with your neighbor, the Watkins Dealer, who
supplies you direct from our factories.  He has no middlemen's profits
or expenses to pay.  That's why he can give you much better quality and
value for the money.
  Every Watkins dealer is an independent merchant in business for
himself.  He lives right in your own community and is a part of it.  He
makes his money there and spends it there.  His children go to the
schools and his taxes help to maintain them, and other community
enterprises.
      
[Slightly larger type that is the full width of the page:]
It wil pay you to know your Watkins Dealer and his handy,
convenient, economical service. [Italicized:] Wait for Watkins-It Pays!

[End of text]

I couldn't help noting the comment about "He has no middlemen's profits
or expenses to pay."  I wonder if they could use that line today.  I
guess technically, an MLM distributor doesn't actually pay for the
profits or expenses of his upline, but nevertheless, the profits are
shared among the upline to varying degrees.  So in that sense, there
are indeed now "middlemen" (and middle-women!) sharing in the profits.

Between some of the pages there are two-sided color pages that are
unnumbered.  One pages features Watkins "Vanilla, Vanillin and
Coumarin" and there is a picture of the bottle which has, on the front,
the formula!  It's pretty hard to read, but as best I can make it out,
it says:

Vanilla Extract.....60.00%
Vanillin............00.24%
Coumarin............00.06%
Alcohol..............4.00%
Sugar Syrup.........35.70%

                   100.00%

(I wonder if the stuff sold today contains that much alcohol?)

There are also color plates featuring Watkins Cocoa and Watkins Nectar
Syrups (the latter were apparently used for making soft drinks, among
other things).  Another plate features "The Watkins City", "A group
view of the Watkins home office buildings, factories and branches..."
It's quite impressive as drawn, but I get the impression that this is
all the company's buildings drawn as though they were in one single
complex (note the word "branches" above).

Finally, for those who would like a recipe, someone wrote (in pencil)
the word "Good" next to this one - I have no idea who's owned this book
over the last 56 years (I think we may have got it at a garage sale,
but I'm not sure), but anyway, someone thought this was a good one:

Blueberry Pie

3 cups fresh blueberries, wash carefully
3/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon butter
2 tablespoons flour or tapioca
1/2 teaspoon Watkins Cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon salt

Sift flour and sugar together, add berries and mix well.  Pour into
pastry-lined pie tin, moisten edge of dough with water, cover with top
crust making opening for steam to escape.  Press pastry well over edge
and trim.  If canned berries are used, measure scant 1/2 cup sugar and
2 tablespoons flour.

Somehow, I think baking is fast becoming a lost art...

Anyway, hope nobody minds this trip down memory lane.  I found it
rather fascinating to look through this old book, and imagine people
baking some of these recipes on old cast-iron wood stoves that had
been in their families since long before the Great Depression (which
was LONG before my time, which makes it all the more interesting).

Jack

---

From: Robin Carroll-Mann <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 31 Jan 94 02:11:42 -0500

>Watkins New Cook Book" that was issued in June, 1936 and had 200 pages.
 
[lots of stuff omitted]

>(I wonder if the stuff sold today contains that much alcohol?)
 
Well, I just wandered over to the kitchen cupboard and pulled out some
little bottles.  The alcohol content for each is:
Pathmark Pure Vanilla Extract - 35%
McCormick Imitation Rum Extract - 35%
Durkee Imitation Orange Extract - a whopping 80%!
 
Of course, the 4% above probably doesn't include whatever alcohol was
in the vanilla extract part of this mixture.
 
BTW, what's coumarin?
 
Robin

---

From: [email-masked] (Ramon Tate)
Date: Mon, 31 Jan 1994 17:12:31 GMT

>Jack Decker <[email-masked]> writes:
[lots of interesting stuff deleted]
>BTW, what's coumarin?
 
Coumarin is the organic chemical that has the aroma typical of new-mown
clover hay. Aside from being found in hay, it is also a minor component, as
I seem to recall, of natural vanilla extract - vanillin being the major
flavor/aroma component.

An interesting sidelight to coumarin - cattle that eat improperly cured
clover hay may suffer an often fatal hemorrhagic condition caused by the
anti-clotting action of dicumarol, which is a derivative of coumarin.
Dicumarol was - and may still be - used as an anticoagulant in human beings.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ramon L. Tate, Ph.D.     |  I do not know which to prefer:
National Institutes      |  The beauty of actions, or the beauty of situations;
   of Health             |  The fastball whistling,
Bldg.31, Rm. 3B27        |  Or just after...
Bethesda, MD 20850       |  - David M. Tate, from "Thirteen Ways of Looking at
[email-masked] |      a Fastball", with apologies to Wallace Stevens

---

From: [email-masked] (Andy Mitcham)
Date: 31 Jan 1994 17:38:58 GMT

>distributors that might be lurking here) ...

Yes, just waiting to pounce on my prey!  :-)

>are indeed now "middlemen" (and middle-women!) sharing in the profits.

Yes, there are indeed people sharing in the profits.  However, this does
not effect the consumer price of the products, the quality or value.  And, 
the customer *is* still served direct from the factory.  So, if you were 
to ask me about that statement, I believe it to still be valid.

>(I wonder if the stuff sold today contains that much alcohol?)

Actually, the amount of alcohol used in Watkins' vanilla is quite low
in comparison to others.  This is one of the reasons Watkins vanilla is
so good -- you loose much less of the vanilla flavor (due to alcohol
evaporation) than when cooking with other vanilla.

> Another plate features "The Watkins City", "A group

I have not been there (yet) but from what I have read and seen, Watkins
World Headquarters in Winona, MN are a conglomeration of several buildings
clustered in close proximity to one another.  Each was built as the space
was needed.  Even their present administrative headquarters, impressive
as it is, was once used for storage of products.

Presently, the main Watkins complex consists of seven buildings.  Building 
1 is administration, buildings 2 and 6 are the main production and packaging 
areas, and buildings 3, 4 and 5 provide warehouse space for raw materials, 
packaging materials and finished product storage.  Building 7 houses the
J.R. Watkins Museum and Store.

All the buildings have a basement and are interconnected.  The total area
is 375,000 feet.

>Somehow, I think baking is fast becoming a lost art...

Yes, I am afraid so.  But we're doing our part to preserve the tradition.

>was LONG before my time, which makes it all the more interesting).

Thank you, Jack, for sharing this information.  One thing I simply cannot
get enough of -- Watkins impeccable heritage and tradition.  

You have a real treasure there.  Let me know if you'd like to donate it ;-)

-- 
Andrew Mitcham
Watkins Ind. Mktg. Rep.
(800)876-1868
--
All opinions expressed are my own and not of my employer.

---

From: [email-masked] (Nick Maclaren)
Date: Mon, 31 Jan 1994 22:50:54 GMT

>I seem to recall, of natural vanilla extract - vanillin being the major

Also woodruff, which has more of it and is used to give that flavour to
drinks (e.g. the German May Bowl).

< Dicumarol was - and may still be - used as an anticoagulant in human beings.

Not to say rat poison ....

Nick Maclaren
University of Cambridge Computer Laboratory,
New Museums Site, Pembroke Street,
Cambridge CB2 3QG, England.
Email:  [email-masked]
Tel.:   +44 223 334761
Fax:    +44 223 334679

---

From: [email-masked] (Jane Beckman)
Date: 3 Feb 94 01:00:35 GMT

>Not to say rat poison ....
Under the trade name Warfarin.  

Warfarin aside, I find I like the taste (actually smell) of
coumarin so much that I treasure an old bottle of
"contaminated" Mexican vanilla.  There has been a huge scare
about this stuff, lately, with folks told to toss it out.
Send it to me!

Seriously, the amounts found in may wine (anyone seen any for
some years, since the coumarin scare?) and small amounts of
vanilla probably aren't going to hurt you.  I don't recommend
drinking Mexican vanilla, though.  Or drinking Schilling Pure
Vanilla, either.  ;-)  

One of the better sources for coumarin is melliot or sweet
clover, which was called for in many old recipes.  I've used
it, and can attest the flavor is better than woodruff.

It's almost a craving I get for coumarin...like heaven
extract.  Probably not as harmful as, say, bitter almonds... ;-)

--
  Jilara   [[email-masked]]
That's how freedom will end: not with a bang, but with a rustle of file
folders.  If you love any of your rights, defend all of them!
-Joe Chew, on the net

---

From: [email-masked] (John E. Taylor III)
Date: Wed, 2 Feb 1994 08:10:57 -0500

In article <[email-masked]>, [email-masked]

> I seem to recall, of natural vanilla extract - vanillin being the major

The hydroxy derivative of coumarin is the major ingredient in Warfarin
brand of rat poison--it does act as an anticoagulant, sort of a chemically
induced hemophelia in the rats.  We eat lots of things in minute quantities
that are pretty toxic in larger amounts.  I'd be concerned about somebody
making up batches of artificial vanilla and adding coumarin, though.  Could
make an interesting "oops."

--
John Taylor
[email-masked]

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From: [email-masked] (Andy Mitcham)
Date: 3 Feb 1994 15:19:02 GMT

My understanding is that coumarin has been outlawed in the U.S. for many,
many years though it is still used in Mexican Vanilla, I think (which is
good argument -not- to use Mexican Vanilla IMO).  At any rate, there is 
no coumarin in Watkins Vanilla nowadays.